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Bennington Triangle
The is a large area of ostensibly anomalous land located in southwestern Vermont in the United States. Reportedly centered around Glastenbury Mountain, a 3,748-foot mountain located in the Green Mountains range, the Bennington Triangle was the site of five as-of-yet unsolved disappearances from 1945 to 1950.https://allthatsinteresting.com/bennington-triangle The first reported disappearance was that of 74-year-old hunting guide Middie Rivers, who disappeared after getting too far ahead of the group he was guiding. The only trace of his left was a single rifle cartridge found in a stream. This disappearance occurred on November 12, 1945. 13 months later, on December 1, 1946, 18-year-old college student Paula Jean Welden went on a relaxing nature hike on the Long Trail. The last people to have ever seen her alive was an elderly couple, who claimed that she was walking approximately 100 yards ahead of them. They claimed that she turned a corner, only for her to vanish when they finally got to it. The local sheriffs staged a search, but Welden's family believed that the search was poorly handled, leading to the eventual creation of the Vermont State Police. The disappearance of Paula Jean Welden has since gone down in history as the biggest disappearance case in Vermont history. Interestingly enough, both Middie Rivers and Paula Jean Welden disappeared along the Long Road. Exactly three years to the day after Welden's vanishing, James Tedford vanished on a bus from St. Albans to Bennington. Witnesses claimed that he was still on the bus at the penultimate stop before Bennington, mean that he disappeared sometime between that stop and the stop at Bennington. His bags were still in the luggage rack. Two individuals disappeared in 1950, concluding the five-year span of disappearances. The first was eight-year-old Paul Jephson, the only child of the victims. On October 12, 1950, Jephson's mother left him unattended for approximately one hour while she fed some pigs. Upon her return, he had vanished. Despite the efforts of search parties, no trace of Paul was discovered. The fifth and final disappearance occurred 16 days later. 53-year-old Frieda Langer and her cousin Herbert Elsner went on a hike near their family campsite near the Somerset Reservoir. Langer slipped into a stream and decided to go back to camp to change into a fresh set of clothes while Herbert waited there. After a while, Herbert returned to camp, only to discover from the family that she never arrived at the campsite. Five searches were conducted over the next couple of weeks, but she wasn't found. However, seven months later, on May 12, 1951, her body was discovered in a previously searched area of the Somerset Reservoir. No cause of death was ever determined, but it is unusual that she was the only victim whose body was eventually found.http://www.benningtontriangle.com/ *'Paranormal Phenomena:' The alleged cases of UFO activity in the area have led some to believe that those who disappeared in the triangle were abducted by aliens. Others have suggested that the victims were sucked into interdimensional portals, but there is, of course, no evidence to support such a suggestion. *'Murder:' It has also been hypothesized that the disappearances were the work of a serial killer or kidnapper. *The 1987 novel Shadow Child by Vermont author and folklorist Joseph A. Citro largely revolves around the Bennington Triangle.https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/266528.Shadow_Child *The Bennington Triangle was examined in the "Mysterious Vanishings" episode of the Discovery Channel series Weird of What?. Bennington.jpeg|A proposed map of the area Category:All entries Category:Locations Category:United States Category:Vermont